What happened to my Bh-5 ?

[farksy]

Got these rams a month ago for what i considered to be a steal. Around USD$120. [If i'm not wrong]

According to the ram list in this section, this ram was a Old Skool Bh-5.
2x512Mb Corsair CMX512-3200LLPT XMS3205v1.1

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y76/farksy/Pic1.jpg
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y76/farksy/Pic2.jpg

Went home and tested it, did 250Mhz 3.2V without a sweat.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y76/farksy/Preview.jpg

However, once i got to the 26XMhz stage, i encounted all sorts of errors.
I did around 2-3 days of tweaking and finally came up with 263Mhz @ 3.6V. And it only passed 25 rounds with looser timings.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y76/farksy/LatestStable.jpg

What i used was

Dfi Lp nf4-D Rev.A00 [Earliest revision when i sent in for RMA, got burnt in use recently :( ]
AMD A64 3000+ LBBLE 0545 CPAW
Verudium Vortex 430W.
A small 60mm fan to blow on the rams.
I guess the rest of the parts are redundant.

So any gurus have any idea what happened ? Was it a sucky board ? A lousy batch of bh-5s ? Or my lousy overclocking skill ? I see you guys do 270Mhz without breaking a sweat man. Might need some suggestions on how to improve this overclock.

Thanks in advance to all who can help =D

[Lastviking]

Did you use orange dimm slots?

[farksy]

Yup. i tried both colors. Didn't work out =(.

And i forgot to add, i did burn in. I think i did 2 sessions per day, one when i'm sleeping, around 6 hours of looping memtest #5, and when i'm at school, which amounts to around 8-10 hours. Did this for around 1 week before i sort of gave up and swapped back to my OCZ El Plat Rev2.

[Lastviking]

Yup. i tried both colors. Didn't work out =(.

And i forgot to add, i did burn in. I think i did 2 sessions per day, one when i'm sleeping, around 6 hours of looping memtest #5, and when i'm at school, which amounts to around 8-10 hours. Did this for around 1 week before i sort of gave up and swapped back to my OCZ El Plat Rev2.

What board do you get instead of your old? same but newer rev?. Try one and one stick when you get the new board.

[farksy]

What board do you get instead of your old? same but newer rev?. Try one and one stick when you get the new board.
Still in the process of RMA-ing. :D

I'll try each stick on it's own. Anyway, which slot is better for a single channel ?

[GMX]

You have to use the upper slot anyway towards the edge of the board for Single channel

[Vincentvega18]

Looks like it could be a few things there, memcontroller (was it stable at 263 in windows?), psu and probably need more cooling on the ram, try at least 1 120mm fan. Just checking but did you up the htt and chipset voltage?

[farksy]

You have to use the upper slot anyway towards the edge of the board for Single channel

Ok ... thanks !

Looks like it could be a few things there, memcontroller (was it stable at 263 in windows?), psu and probably need more cooling on the ram, try at least 1 120mm fan. Just checking but did you up the htt and chipset voltage?

Well i guess it wasn't stable. Maybe 260Mhz should be. Somehow i do agree on the cooling part, should go get that 'upgraded'. About HTT and chipset voltage, i did increase it. I think it's 1.55Vcore and 1.7V Chipset voltage. It's pretty hot here in Singapore and i don't really want to fry my chipset with 1.8V unless it's for suicide purposes.

About the PSU, nothing i can do about it. Was running this PSU with a 6600, 2 120mm fans and a 80mm fan. I reckoned it was enough, but then again, a more stable PSU does give you better clocks.

[metro.cl]

270mhz are cherry picked ram....


dont expect every old bh5 to do that

[Lastviking]

270mhz are cherry picked ram....


dont expect every old bh5 to do that


Yes for memtest is 270mhz very good for old bh5. Super pi1m then 276+ are good with 23c

The worst old bh5 i have tested are maxing about 267mhz super pi1m

I have lost how many sticks i have tested.. but its about 20+ (512mb)

[afireinside]

512mb sticks don't clock as well, you probably need a fan over them, and you need to take the heatspreaders off.

[Reefa_Madness]

I know you were asked this, but I didn't see your reply...did you test each stick individually? It is entirely possible that one stick is better than the other.

If so, then consider reprogramming the SPD of the "worse" stick with the SPD from the better stick using Thaiphoon Burner and see if that doesn't give you a better matched set and perhaps a few more MHz in dual channel. There are numerous posts in this thread from guys that claim to have improved the performance of their BH-5 based modules by doing an SPD programming.

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=85533

Of course, like many of the things that are tried here at XS, there are always risks that the outcome may not be as hoped for. Use your own judgement on whether or not there would be any benefit to you from doing this.

[loc.o]

Yes for memtest is 270mhz very good for old bh5. Super pi1m then 276+ are good with 23c

The worst old bh5 i have tested are maxing about 267mhz super pi1m

I have lost how many sticks i have tested.. but its about 20+ (512mb)

276+ with what vdimm and timings you test ? Bought me a pair that does this with 3.53 in bios but not much higher even with more vdimm, at least not with these timings.

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/9017/2712spi1m353biosa648ax.th.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/my.php?image=2712spi1m353biosa648ax.jpg)

[Revv23]

what kind of cooling was on the ram when tested?

[STEvil]

"heatspreaders" installed?

[Vincentvega18]

what kind of cooling was on the ram when tested?
he said a 60mm fan, which is why i suggested something a little beefier.

[Lastviking]

276+ with what vdimm and timings you test ? Bought me a pair that does this with 3.53 in bios but not much higher even with more vdimm, at least not with these timings.



Some sticks dont like high vdimm. My Gskill bh-utt need 3.6v from a ultra d(real ~3.68v) to make 271mhz super pi1m(but more vdimm do they not like). My best old bh5 do ~279mhz with 3.83v real vdimm(about 3.76v with ultra d). I have olso had 2x512 old bh5 sticks that didnt like over 3.6v(3.68v real) on the ultra-d board

[farksy]

I guesses the optimum Vdimm for mine is 3.58V [3.5V + 0.03V], any higher and it's giving me errors. Time to get some bigger fans and strip off that heatspreader !

Thanks to all that have helped, if possible i'll post some new results when i get my board and my rams [with my friend] back =D.

For others who have some whacky solutions, i might not hesitate to try it as well.

[[cTx]Philosophy]

For others who have some whacky solutions, i might not hesitate to try it as well.
give dem to me if u dont like em :P :slap:

[God_Lx]

Well, my 2x512Mb Mushkin LVL2 are about that... 260Mhz @ 3.45 it's the best they'll do... More vdimm it's just more memtest errors... 92mm fan over them... Not all BH-5 does +270 :)